You work hard to build a great company and make salary. But what about the rest of your life? What do you do when you don’t have to worry about your website or email client (or both)? Do you rely on a third-party provider or create your own? It can be tough, but it’s important to make the right decisions when it comes to web hosting. So, how do you know which site will serve your needs best? Compare and compare!
This guide will show you the Comparison of Web Hosting Sites, best web hosting, best web hosting for small business, and best web hosting for beginners.
Comparison of Web Hosting Sites
What is a Web Hosting Site?
A web hosting site is a website that provides hosting and other services to websites. There are many different types of web hosting sites, each with its own pros and cons. Some of the more common types of web hosting sites include:
1. Hosting Sites
Hosting a website requires only an internet connection and some basic software, such as WordPress or Drupal. This type of site can be used by anyone, regardless of experience or technical abilities. However, this type of hosting can be expensive to set up and maintain, so it’s not recommended for small businesses or startups.
2. Cloud Hosting Sites
Cloud hosters provide servers where your website can be hosted without having to worry about internet connections or space. Instead, your website is stored on a remote server and accessed when you need it. Cloud hosts often offer a lower price per month than traditional hostingsites but they may have limited features or support.
3. Baremetal Hosting Sites
Baremetal hosters require no internet connection and instead use physical servers to house your website. Thesesites can be expensive to set up and maintain, but they offer the best performance for high-traffic websites. However, baremetal hosts can also provide malware protection for your site if you choose to install it.
Best Web Hosting
1. DreamHost
Not everyone wants to sign a long contract for hosting, but you usually have to in order to get the lowest price. That usually also means dropping $75, $100, or more at checkout.
DreamHost offers good deals for one- or three-year terms, but their month-to-month pricing cannot be beat.
It’s seriously the lowest monthly rate you’ll see.
DreamHost Shared Starter is only $1.99/month for one site. No contract necessary.
There’s really no way to get a lower price without a commitment.
When you look at the month-to-month pricing for other plans on this list, there is no competition. A2 Hosting is $10.99/month, HostGator is $10.95/month, and Hostinger is $9.99 with a $4.99 setup fee.
Bluehost and iPage don’t even offer plans without at least a year-long commitment.
With DreamHost, you can still get cheap hosting, but you don’t have any of the long-term risk that comes with a multi-year contract.
This can be really important if you’re running a cash-strapped startup betting on growth. Instead of a big upfront spend, you can budget a predictable monthly hosting cost into the equation.
Not only that, but you also get a solid range of features and free tools to build your site:
- Unlimited traffic
- 50 GB storage
- Free SSL certificate
- Free WordPress website builder
- Free automated WordPress migrations
- Automated WordPress updates
- 24/7 live chat and ticket support
Like Bluehost, DreamHost is officially recommended by WordPress. The integration is deep and all of the updates are handled automatically. This is good for security purposes and saves you the trouble of doing it yourself.
So you can get all the benefits of tight WordPress integration without the commitment and large down payment required by Bluehost.
2. Hostinger
The main thing that Hostinger has going for it is the super-low $0.99/mo intro price.
The downside is that you have to commit to a four-year-long contract upfront – and pay for that entire period on day one as well.
One thing we have to give to Hostinger is that they’re very transparent when it comes to renewal prices. Right below the plan selection box, you’ll see the renewal prices for each of the contract lengths.
Current pricing for their cheapest plan:
| Monthly Plan | 1-Year Plan | 2-Year Plan | 4-Year Plan |
|---|---|---|---|
| $9.99/mo (renews: same) | $41.88 (renews: $5.99/mo) | $59.76 (renews: $4.99/mo) | $95.52 (renews: $3.99/mo) |
There’s a 30-day money-back guarantee.
This includes:
- 1 website
- 1 email account
- SSL (https:)
This does not include:
- Domain name ($9.99/year)
- Daily backups ($11.40/year)
- CDN ($9.95/year)
3. SiteGround
Best for Extra Support
Never built a website before? No problem. Get everything you need to launch your website in a day (with no experience required), plus hands-on customer support that’s always ready to answer your questions and help you out in an affordably priced hosting package with SiteGround.
Overall Score: 3.6 out of 5
Lots of hosting companies promise you the moon, but when things go wrong they don’t have your back.
Not SiteGround. They offer one-on-one support for all their customers and are always available to help via live chat or phone call.
SiteGround has real humans answering customer service calls 24/7 in over 10 languages, giving them an advantage over other hosting providers who rely on bots to answer customer questions and avoid the hard work of hiring people to actually speak with customers.
Our experience was pleasant and the best out of all other providers when dealing with customer service.
Here’s how well they did in our testing categories:
- Upfront Cost = 3/5
- Renewal Rates = 1/5
- Onboarding Process = 5/5
- Website Speed = 4/5
- Customer Support = 5/5
- Server Uptime = 5/5
Upfront Cost 3/5 – SiteGround is the most expensive on our list for cheap web hosting. That’s the main reason for the score being so low overall.
Right out of the gate you pay $3.99/month for 12 months, which equals $47.88 for year one of hosting.
4. A2 Hosting
If you grow your ecommerce site past a certain point, the cheapest web hosting options won’t work. But, if you are just getting your online store up and running, there is no better budget-friendly option than A2 Hosting.
In fact, you can get everything you need to launch for $2.99/month with the A2 Startup plan. You’ll have to sign a contract to get the lowest rate, but you’ll be ready to go within minutes.
Along with PayPal integration, the cheapest A2 hosting plan comes with one-click installs for five of the top ecommerce platforms, including WooCommerce, OpenCart, and Magneto. There’s hardly any backend IT work to start selling.
A2 Hosting offers some of the best site speed and security for the price, which are really important for online stores.
Shoppers won’t stay if your content is slow to load. A2 takes care of all the technical legwork that goes into maintaining high performance servers. It’s compatible with Cloudflare’s free content delivery network, which can boost your speed as well.
Most shoppers won’t even come if Google says your site’s not safe. That’s going to happen if you don’t have an SSL certificate. A2 includes one for free, and it’s always enabled.
This is a huge perk, because you can get free SSL certificates elsewhere, but it’s on you to configure and renew them, which can be frustrating.
Most of the other security benefits are similarly hands off. The virus scanner, firewall, and brute force defense are on autopilot—you’ll receive notification if there’s something you need to do, but A2 handles a lot on its own.
And if you have an issue you can’t solve, A2 will help. Go read reviews. The company has some of the happiest web hosting customers on the planet. If you need to move your old site to A2’s servers, they have a team that will do it for free.
Some of the other excellent benefits of A2 Startup include:
- 100 GB storage
- Unlimited bandwidth
- Unlimited email addresses
- 24/7/365 customer support via phone, live chat, email, and ticketing
- 99.9% uptime commitment
- Optimized WordPress hosting
- DNS management tools
- Website staging
Website staging is really useful for online stores. You can test new features and buttons on a page in a development area before pushing it live. This way you can see if anything breaks before it impacts your customers.
The A2 Startup plan is aptly named—it won’t be enough once your site matures. But by the time you’ve hit that milestone, your site will be bringing in more than enough money to justify the cost of upgrading.
5. Bluehost
Bluehost offers three main price points, depending on the contract length that you choose. The cheapest one at $2.75/mo is a good offer if you’re planning to keep your site up for at least three years.
Feature-wise, there’s everything that you might need to get started with one website. You get 10 GB of disk space and the bandwidth is unmetered, which means that as long as you’re not getting huge traffic spikes, your site will continue to work.
On top of that, you also get a free domain name for the first year.
Current pricing for their cheapest plan:
| Monthly Plan | 1-Year Plan | 2-Year Plan | 3-Year Plan |
|---|---|---|---|
| Not available | $33.90 (renews: $9.99/mo) | Not Available | $178.20 (renews: $8.99/mo) |
There’s a 30-day money-back guarantee.
This includes:
- 1 website
- Unmetered bandwidth
- 5 email accounts
- Free domain (for 1 year, renews at $12.99/year)
- SSL (https:)
This does not include:
- Domain Privacy ($11.88/year)
- CodeGuard Basic ($35.88/year)
- Bluehost SEO tools ($23.88/year)
- SiteLock security ($35.88/year)
Best Web Hosting For Small Business
1. Bluehost: Best for beginners
Bluehost is a perennial favorite for personal and business web hosting because of how easy it is to set up and use the company’s services. Like Namecheap, Bluehost offers very affordable web hosting solutions for small businesses that need simple sites and complex e-commerce outfits alike. You can even get a free domain when signing up for some of their one-year plans.
Bluehost offers the following hosting packages:
- Shared: The most commonly used option by individuals and small-business owners alike. Includes e-commerce compatibility, WordPress integration and dedicated customer service for $7.99 per month.
- VPS: Upgrades from the Shared tier to provide a virtual private server, which adds a level of security and access for businesses that need more flexibility with how they use their server space. Costs $29.99 per month.
- Dedicated: Provides the utmost level of security and support for high-traffic websites. This is one of the best web hosting options for small businesses with robust e-commerce websites that need as much bandwidth and security as possible. Costs $119.99 per month.
2. HostGator
HostGator is our top recommended hosting provider for small businesses, scoring an impressive 4.9 out of 5 in our research overall. This is a huge leap from its previous third place position in our pre-2022 rankings when it scored 4.3! It’s a beginner-friendly, feature-rich service with a reliable uptime of 99.99%.
HostGator’s plans are relatively cheap, and they come with a 45-day money-back guarantee, so small businesses can test out the water without risking precious savings. It’s also worth mentioning that HostGator has the highest help and support score of any hosting provider we tested – across all categories, not just small businesses!
Price: 3.7/5
When it comes to HostGator’s shared plans, there’s plenty for you to sink your teeth into. The three shared packages are:
- Hatchling – from $2.75/month. Entry-level, and great value for money.
- Baby – from $3.50/month. Offers more help for those growing a small business.
- Business – from $5.25/month. Best for businesses that are already growing fast.
We highly recommend shared hosting plans for small businesses. They don’t cost a lot of money, and you get a lot of bang for your buck. Plus, the 45-day money-back guarantee is a low-risk way of trying it out for yourself before making a decision.
3. Namecheap: Best for technical support
If you’re a newcomer to managing your website, the best web hosting for your small business might be the one that provides you with round-the-clock technical support, and is willing to go the extra mile to make sure your site is up and running just the way you want it.
Namecheap goes above and beyond in this department, offering 24/7 support through chat — no question is too big or too small for Namecheap’s team of technical support specialists, who are even willing to step in and make changes for their customers if they don’t have the technical savvy to do it themselves. And as the name implies, their web hosting prices are pretty competitive as well.
There are several Namecheap hosting tiers:
- Stellar Business: Provides unmetered bandwidth so your site never slows down during high-traffic periods. Comes with free automatic backups as well, and is PCI compliant and e-commerce friendly. Costs $4.44 per month for the first year, then goes up to $8.88 per month.
- EasyWP Turbo: Inexpensive hosting for WordPress sites with up to 250,000 visitors per month and 50 gigabytes of storage included. Costs $7.88 per month, with the first month for $2.
- Qasar: Full VPS hosting with Linux-based servers, allowing companies that need a total command of their networks the flexibility to run their digital presence as they see fit. Costs $24.88 per month, with a new signup promotion of $19.88 per month.
- Xeon E3-1240 v3: A physical server solution for businesses that need to go the extra mile for their websites and digital environments. Costs $74.88 per month, with the first month for $36.88.
Best Web Hosting For Beginners
1. SiteGround
SiteGround is one of the most popular web hosts with a first-class reputation stretching far and wide, from Canada to Singapore. You know why? They tick all the boxes. Not only do they offer a custom-built beginner-friendly dashboard, but also an easy onboarding process, and excellent support.
Maybe that’s why SiteGround is a little pricier than Bluehost, but they make up for that with some of the best support in the hosting industry.
Top features for beginners
- Website setup wizard – after you sign up, SiteGround offers a simple wizard to help you launch your website.
- User-friendly custom dashboard – SiteGround built its own user-friendly hosting dashboard that makes it easy to manage your website(s) and access key tools.
- Free email hosting – SiteGround makes it easy to create your own branded email address.
- Automatic WordPress updates – if you’re using WordPress, SiteGround automatically updates the software for you.
- Automatic backups – SiteGround automatically backs up your data on all plans to keep for peace of mind.
- Excellent 24/7 support – SiteGround offers 24/7 support via phone, live chat, online tickets, and has top-rated support according to the 800+ users who participated in our WordPress hosting survey.
Pricing
SiteGround offers three hosting plans:
- StartUp – $2.99 per month for a single website.
- GrowBig – $4.99 per month for unlimited websites.
- GoGeek – $7.99 per month for unlimited websites with more resources and priority support.
For most beginners, we recommend the GrowBig plan because it gives you the ability to host unlimited websites and adds new features that speed up your site and help you more conveniently manage your site.
2. Hostinger
| Features | Free SSL, weekly backups, SSD storage, LiteSpeed web server |
| Uptime | 100% |
| Speed | 511ms |
| Best for | Cheap performance-focused hosting for beginners |
Hostinger dominates as one of the best web hosting providers for beginners not only for its simplicity but also because of its affordability. This combination of being inexpensive and easy to use makes Hostinger one of the best providers for virtually any purpose. What’s more, it doesn’t scrimp on excellent features and performance despite its pocket-friendly price tag.
Here are Hostinger’s highlights for beginners:
- Hostinger has its own custom control panel called hPanel. It’s powerful and functional without being intimidating – perfect panel for beginners! You will get to enjoy 1-click installations and a dedicated WordPress management tool.
- There’s an impressive variety of customer support options available: 24/7 live chat, email, a ticketing system, and a comprehensive knowledge base. Based on personal experience, their agents are particularly skilled and very friendly.
- The host uses the latest tech to ensure fast and reliable performance results. LiteSpeed web server technology, caching, and the latest PHP are just some examples of the performance-boosting features it offers.
Hostinger ticks all the most important boxes: price, ease of use, customer service, and performance. I’ll admit that while I was a bit sceptical at first, the results quelled my doubts.
Hostinger performance
When testing Hostinger’s performance, the host proved to be both speedy and dependable. I monitored its performance for over 2 months, during which it sustained a 100% uptime. What’s more, the fully-built websites loaded in less than a second and even the cheapest entry plan handled high levels of traffic quite remarkably.
These results are an outcome of the LiteSpeed web servers that Hostinger has implemented, which comes with built-in caching. Also, if you’re gunning for an international site, you’ll be pleased to know that Hostinger has servers in the UK, US, Brazil, Netherlands, Singapore, Indonesia, and Lithuania.
3. Bluehost
Bluehost is a popular web host that makes a great option for beginners thanks to its affordable pricing and beginner-friendly onboarding process.
Once you sign up for Bluehost, the Bluehost website wizard will guide you through setting up your website in just a few minutes. Bluehost also has built their own custom hosting dashboard on top of the “standard” cPanel dashboard that makes it a lot easier to manage important parts of your hosting account, like creating your own custom email address.
Top features for beginners
- Simple setup wizard – Bluehost has built a super simple onboarding process that helps you quickly get up and running with your first site.
- One-click installers – Bluehost also includes a one-click installer if you want to create additional sites after you go through the initial onboarding.
- Custom hosting dashboard – Bluehost built their own custom dashboard (on top of cPanel) that makes it easy for beginners to perform key actions.
- Automatic WordPress updates – if you’re using WordPress, Bluehost automatically updates the software for you to keep you up to date.
- Free email hosting – Bluehost makes it easy to create your own email account at no extra cost.
- 24/7 support – get help whenever you need it via phone or live chat.
Pricing
Bluehost offers affordable plans, especially if you’re willing to pay for multiple years upfront.
- Basic – from $2.75 per month for a single website.
- Plus – from $5.45 per month for unlimited websites.
- Choice Plus – from $5.45 per month for unlimited websites with added features like CodeGuard backups.
Most beginners looking for a simple web hosting solution should go with at least the Plus plan because it gives you the flexibility to create multiple websites. The Choice Plus is also a good option because it adds automatic backups, which will keep your data safe.
You’ll also get a free domain name for your first year, which is a nice benefit.
Conclusion
Choosing the best Web Hosting Site for your company is an important decision. There are a number of different types of Web Hosting Sites, each with its own benefits and drawbacks. To get a better understanding of which site is right for you, compare and compare them. Once you have chosen the best site for your business, make sure to check its website for details.